A Guided Palming Session Using Imagination As An Aid To Vision

“Persons with normal vision use their memory, or imagination…”

– William H. Bates, M.D.

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Palming, covering your eyes with the palms of your hands, gently encourages your eyes and mind to rest. While you are palming, remembering moments of clarity, imagining pleasant scenes, thinking about familiar people, places and things that make you feel happy or induce other positive emotions, further relaxes your eyes and soothes your mind. This physical and mental relaxation releases strain and is the foundation of normal vision.

In this post, I offer an audio recording that you can listen to while you do some palming. I incorporate imagination as an aid to vision, to release strain and to stimulate and reawaken the naturally relaxed and effortless use of your eyes.

This Guided Palming recording is based on Margaret Darst Corbett’s “memory and imagination through mental pictures” experiments from her 1949 book, “Help Yourself To Better Sight”, Chapter IV, “General Relaxation: Mental,” page 46.

Read over the following experiments. Select the one that appeals to you, then sit down comfortably, cover your closed eyes with your palms, and try it. Do not work with or think of your eyes. Remember, mental pictures are memory pictures deep back in the mind, not forward in the physical eye.

Stand on a balcony of a little cabin at the edge of a crystal-clear mountain lake in the deep woods. On the floor of the balcony have a basket of heavy balls of various sizes. Pick up the largest ball, give it a mighty heave. It will splash Ito the placid water and disappear, sending a series of strong ripples circling out towards the shore. Finally, the ripples fade, the lake is snooth again, mirroring the sky and surrounding trees. Now throw the next largest ball and watch the ripples, not quite as far-moving or so violent. Choose and toss ball after ball, watching the splash and the ripples, each ball smaller until you take the very smallest, the size and weight of a marble. This makes little fast-traveling ripples that very quickly quiet down, and once more allow the water’s surface to smooth and reflect a puff of passing cloud.

“You cannot mentally do two things at one time. It is impossible to remember pleasant scenes and simultaneously, to worry over problems, which means to strain.”

– Margaret Darst Corbett

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Closing your eyes

But before palming, it’s good to know that just closing your eyes is one of the first, and simplest. steps you can take towards improving your vision. It can be done anywhere and at anytime when it is safe to do so. Simply closing your eyes is helpful for experiencing complete and effortless relaxation of the eyes and mind, which Is so necessary for reawakening natural vision. With your eyes closed, you are less tempted to strain, to do something, to try to see. With your eyes closed, there is nothing for your eyes to do. They can simply rest.

In his original 1920 book, “The Cure For Imperfect Sight By Treatment Without Glasses,” William H. Bates, M.D. states,

“All the methods used in the cure of errors of refraction are simply different ways of obtaining relaxation, and most patients, though by no means all, find it easiest to relax with their eyes shut. This usually lessens the strain to see, and in such cases is followed by a temporary or more lasting improvement in vision.”

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Simply closing your eyes and resting them is sometimes all that’s needed to wake up your naturally clear vision. It is easy to do and incorporate into your natural vision practice. The improvement in vision can happen quickly and be quite noticeable.

Dr. Bates goes on to describe how closing and resting the eyes while alternately looking at a “Snellen test card” (or eye chart), can be used practically for improving vision.

“Most patients are benefited merely by closing the eyes, and by alternately resting them for a few minutes, or longer in this way and then, opening them and looking at a Snellen test card for a second or less, flashes of improved vision are as a rule very quickly obtained. Some temporarily obtain almost normal vision by this means, and in rare cases a complete cure has been effected, sometime in less than an hour.”

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Regarding Palming, Dr. Bates writes,

“But since some light comes through the closed eyelids, a still greater degree of relaxation can be obtained, in all but a few exceptional cases, by excluding it. This is done by covering the closed eyes with the palms of the hands (the fingers being crossed upon the forehead) in such a way as to avoid pressure on the eyeballs. So efficacious is this practice, which I have called “palming,” as a means of relieving strain, that we all instinctively resort to it at times, and from it most people are able to get a considerable degree of relaxation.”

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Palming is very good for encouraging your eyes to relax, let go and make no effort to see. They are taken “off line” temporarily and allowed to do nothing. But what about your mind? What is your mind doing while your eyes are enjoying the luxury of resting in darkness?

For some, just palming is the ticket to relaxation. But for many, other techniques are needed to help occupy, sooth and encourage the mind to relax. If your mind has difficulty relaxing during palming, your eyes will have difficulty relaxing as well. A relaxed mind encourages relaxed eyes; and relaxed eyes encourage naturally relaxed and clear vision.

Relaxing your mind

Dr. Bates talked much about the need for the mind to be relaxed in order to have normal vision.

“We see very largely with the mind, and only partly with the eyes.”

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He described many techniques for relaxing the mind, and in doing so relaxing the eyes. All techniques for relaxing the mind also tend to be techniques for relaxing the eyes. Generally, they involve the same principles as natural vision – relaxation, movement, central fixation, memory and imagination.

Using your imagination

Dr. Bates used imagination as a tool for helping his patients improve their vision. By imagining seeing clearly, his patients were actually able to see more clearly. Since we see primarily with our mind, imagining clarity is a step toward actually seeing clearly.

In the following audio recording, you will be encouraged to Imagine, not only with your eyes, but with your other senses as well. You will be guided and encouraged to pay attention to details, invoke positive thoughts, attitudes and emotions. Ultimately you will be encouraged to relax into the present moment.

When you are seeing clearly, your mind and eyes are relaxed; when you are imagining seeing clearly, your mind and eyes are relaxed. In both cases, whether you’re seeing clearly or imagining seeing clearly, your mind and the eyes are relaxed. And, mental and physical relaxation is necessary for clear natural vision.

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While you are palming, I will guide you in using your imagination in relaxing your eyes and mind. Let’s get started.

Set yourself up for palming

For this palming session, remove your glasses or contacts.

As a word of caution, do not listen to this recording while driving.

You will be practicing this guided palming session sitting in a chair, with your elbows resting on a table or desk, and your palms covering your closed eyes. You can place books or pillows on the table or desk, under your elbows, to find the best height and to make yourself comfortable. 

Take your time getting yourself set up so that you’ll be really comfortable while you’re palming.

Guided Palming Session Using Imagination As An Aid To Vision

Thank you for listening!

I hope you found this guided Palming session helpful and relaxing.

Resources

• “The Cure For Imperfect Sight By Treatment Without Glasses” by William H. Bates
• “The Bates Method For Better Eyesight Without Glasses” by William H. Bates
• “Help Yourself To Better Sight” by Margaret Darst Corbett